


Achilles, Come Down

by mrnotaboy



Category: Fire Emblem Series, Fire Emblem: Fuuin no Tsurugi | Fire Emblem: Binding Blade
Genre: Attempted Murder, Blood and Gore, Dark, Darkfic, Discussion of sexual assault, Lilina is the smartest person in the room, Lowen is Wolt's dad, M/M, Murder, Mystery, Near Death Experiences, OR IS IT??, One-Sided Relationship, Past Sexual Abuse, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Power Imbalance, Rating May Change, Will update tags as we go, i mean it's a murder mystery, kind of a character study?, necrophobia tw, no betas we die like friendless losers, of an OC, seplophobia tw, septophobia tw, what do you expect
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-10-24
Updated: 2020-12-30
Packaged: 2021-01-02 01:22:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 11,220
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21153257
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mrnotaboy/pseuds/mrnotaboy
Summary: When a strange, violent shadow suddenly descends on Pherae, Roy is forced to rethink both his relationships and his place in the world.[Previously titled 'Sanguineum', currently going through edits and revisions]





	1. the taste of strawberries

**Author's Note:**

> This is the story that Desiderium was a palate cleanser for! 
> 
> Some world-state notes:  
Roy and Wolt have only acheived B-rank support  
Wolt went with Roy to Ostia as per FE Heroes  
Wolt and Lilina are friends because fuck off FE Heroes  
Lilina is already queen of a united Lycia  
They are all adults (it's been 17 years IntSys let my boys grow up with me pls)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _The self is not so weightless  
Nor whole and unbroken  
Remember the pact of our youth_   
_Where you go  
I'm going  
So jump and I'm jumping  
Since there is no me without you  
_

Wolt, Roy imagined, would taste the way he smells. A little like evergreen and wet earth and the bee’s wax he uses for his bow strings, like old leather and fresh soap. He’d probably taste the salt left on his lips from a too-warm day spent taking care of the dogs and the archery range, and maybe the taste of something a little sweet snuck from the kitchens would be lingering in his mouth. Strawberries, maybe. Something a little tart and pleasant.

Wolt’s hands would be strong and firm on his hips as he pressed Roy into the wall, and Roy would reach up and touch the nape of Wolt’s neck. He’d feel the perspiration there and tangle a hand in Wolt’s hair, feel along his shoulders and back with the other, and they’d press together and fidget and laugh quietly into each other’s mouths as they’d move.

Wolt would pull back softly with one of his bright, genuine grins, and Roy would be grateful for the privacy of the bedroom as he slid to his knees in front of his friend, as he’d pray that his eyes are able to spell out the magnitude of his devotion, the fullness of his heart--

The thought was cut off curtly as someone pounded at the door to Roy’s study, the knocks heavy and rushed. Roy jumped at the sound, embarrassed, and he looked up guiltily from the requisition forms he’d been staring uselessly at for the last ten minutes. 

He’d been caught daydreaming again, he realized with frustration. He was supposed to have been working and instead he’d lost himself in more of those useless thoughts. His cheeks burned red as he called out to whoever was waiting behind the door to enter, shuffling the papers on his desk to distract himself. 

“Enter,” he said, clearing his throat as he did. He shuffled the parchment in front of him awkwardly.

At least it couldn’t be Wolt interrupting--that would just be  _ mortifying _ . He’d gone out hunting for quail earlier in the day, talking about how Roy hadn’t had any in a while, and he wasn’t expected back till dinner time. Roy had been asked along, of course, but he’d woken up that morning with a crick in his neck and decided that his time would be best spent working. All the good that had done him, he thought bitterly, and he glanced up again just as his office’s heavy wooden door flew open.

It was Lance who’d been knocking so determinedly, and when he came into the study he seemed… disheveled. Out of breath. Though his face was as composed as ever, a steely seriousness lay there, and Roy could see the panic that was starting to grow in his eyes. 

“Lord Roy,” he said, urgent and rushed. “You must come and follow me, quickly.” 

He sounded so grave and serious that Roy felt obligated to stand up out of pure bewilderment, and the worms that had been gnawing their way through his stomach were instantly forgotten. If logical, practical Lance of all people was acting so troubled, then...

“Something terrible has happened,” confirmed the knight. “You’re needed.”

\--

It had felt almost surreal when Lance had begun to lead him through the servant’s corridors and out to the kitchens, and each step felt like it had been taken underwater. Had something happened to Lowen? Was there an accident? A fire? Roy’s mind swam with the possibilities, and he rushed to make pace with the taller man he followed. Lowen had to just be waiting for them there in the kitchen. Right?

Alen had posted himself outside the big double doors that led from the main house and into the kitchen proper, and he seemed to be busy shooing away curious maids and the rest of the cooking staff. Wolt’s father, Roy noticed, was nowhere to be seen.

“Go away, you damn vultures,” the knight scolded. “This is none of your business. There’s nothing here to see, so get!”

“Excuse you,  _ Sir _ ,” one of the men loudly objected, ”but I have a great big herring pie in there ready to put on the fire.” From his uniform he seemed to be kitchen staff, portly and short, though Roy couldn’t place his name. The man waved his hands around dramatically and rolled his eyes before glaring passionately at Alen. He clenched his little purple hat in his fist as he continued to speak. 

“If the fish spoils and the pastry dries out what will the master have for his supper?" he asked viciously. "Not to mention that we’re short a man today, and Sir Lowen will take my head if everyone isn’t fed and watered on time!”

Alen narrowed his eyes at him and Lance wisely decided that the right time to intervene was right about then, placing his hand on the small, stocky servant’s shoulder.

“I can assure you,” he said solemnly, “that pies and meal plans are the very last thing on Sir Lowen’s mind at the moment. Get on with you, then. Go.”

The assistant still grumbled, but having seen his lord watching the commotion he left as he was told with a bow, and the rest of the staff that had been milling about followed suite. Roy’s stomach twisted with worry. 

Something  _ must _ be wrong.

Alen sighed heavily as the unwelcome onlookers finally took their leave.

“Thanks,” he said. “The staff all think they can get away with anything ever since Sir Marcus retired, don’t they? Rebecca’s waiting. Have you been informed yet, Lord Roy?”

Roy frowned.

“Just that there’s been an emergency,” he replied. “Is everyone alright?” His eyes drifted to the kitchen door. “No injuries, I hope.

Alen’s mouth set itself into a thin, grim line, and he shook his head slowly as he ushered Roy towards the entranceway. 

“You’d better come in,” he said. “Walls have ears in the downstairs, you know.”

Roy let himself be escorted into the empty kitchen, dread heavy in his stomach, to discover that Wolt’s parents were, indeed, already there. Relief bloomed fervently in his chest. Wolt’s parents were unharmed, Lowen sitting in his chair and Rebecca hoovering at his shoulder. No blood, no fire, no missing fingers or scalded faces. Somehow, though, he knew his dread wouldn’t dissipate for long.

Roy barely had time to process the scene before Rebecca had spotted him. She looked up almost the second that Roy’s feet had touched down on the worn stone, as if on instinct, and immediately she left her husband’s side to go and wrap Roy up in her arms.

“Oh, Roy,” she whispers hoarsely, and he can see that there were tears threatening to spill from her eyes. “Oh, my dear, dear Lord Roy.”

He pat her back in what he hoped was a comforting way. It wasn’t often that he saw Rebecca this upset, that Roy needed to comfort anyone at all, and he was a bit at a loss for what to do. He looked over to Lowen for guidance, but…

But Lowen was crying. Sir Lowen, the cheerful, towering man who fought beside his father and survived wars, was hunched over where he sat with one hand covering his eyes, trying his best to fight back the heavy sobs that were wracking his body. His walking cane lay forgotten on the floor, as if dropped in a moment of shock.

It was unsettling to see this man that he’d grown up with, who’d carried him on his shoulders as a child and sneaked him treats, just sitting in the middle of his kitchen and grieving like his heart had been ripped apart, and suddenly something in the back of Roy’s mind clicked. His veins filled with ice water and his mouth dried up as the realization dawned on him.

“Where’s Wolt?” he asked, and he hated how panicked he sounded. Rebecca didn’t need ‘panicked’. Lowen didn’t need to see his distress, and Roy was  _ not _ going to allow himself to be scared. He couldn’t.

Rebecca said nothing as she squeezed him tighter in her arms, and Roy tried his best to swallow the lump that had formed in his throat. He repeated himself, louder this time:

“Where is Wolt, Lance?”

Lance and Alen shared a look, one that sent dread trickling down Roy’s spine, and Alen made his way across the room to put a firm hand on Lowen’s shoulder. Lance was the one asked, so Lance was going to be the one who had to tell him, they seemed to have decided. Roy braced himself, his heart sinking down to his stomach.

There had been an attack. An animal, they think, maybe a bear. Something with sharp claws and heavy blows, something that could snap a strung bow stave in half.

“You would’ve been the first to know,” Lance continued cautiously. “But the guard who came to tell us--she came to the wrong entrance, and poor Sir Lowen ended up hearing first.”

“That’s why we’re having this talk in the kitchen,” Alen supplied. “Rebecca had wanted to be there with you when you heard--and Lowen’s so distraught that she couldn’t bear to leave him. We didn’t think you’d mind the compromise, m’lord.”

Wolt had been mauled.

He’d been mauled while out with his dogs. Alone. No one to help him, no one to protect him.

“A couple of guards found him in the hunting grounds between the castle and the village,” said Lance. ”A dog had been making a ruckus, and when they followed her… Well.”

He paused to look Roy in the eye, holding his lord’s gaze as if trying to prepare him.

“They said it looked bleak, Lord Roy. We think his dogs managed to chase away whatever predator had attacked him, but we have no idea what the damage is like. We have to be ready to expect anything.”

Roy felt numb, suddenly, and his knees began to buckle as the blood drained from his face. Rebecca must have guided him to a chair at some point, or a chair to him, because the next thing he knew he was sitting down, her gentle, maternal hands soft on his shoulders. Alan had spoken, had said something about complementing the dogs maybe, but in that moment Roy couldn’t really hear him. The heartbeat thumping in his ears was just too loud, and Roy felt like he’d been submerged under a hundred meters of ocean.

Distantly, he could feel that Rebecca still stood next to him, shaking and sniffling. She petted his hair the way she used to back when he was small, all soft and motherly, and suddenly Roy had the overwhelming urge to cry.

Everything about this was wrong.

She shouldn’t be the one doing the comforting, Roy knew. He shouldn’t be the one needing the comfort. Wolt shouldn’t have gone out hunting on his own, and Roy shouldn’t have let him go alone in the first place.

This had to be a punishment, Roy thought briefly. For his daydreams. His weird, inappropriate attraction was one thing, but the way he’d let himself slip into those dumb fantasies? Even the Gods must be angry at him for what he’d let fester in his heart. What he imagined Wolt doing,  _ being _ , without the other’s knowledge or permission.

As quickly as the thought came, though, it’s dismissed. That was a selfish, self absorbed way to think, and he couldn’t afford it right now. He had to focus on what’s important, on what they had to do now, and with a great deal of effort he managed to strengthen his resolve and clear the bile from his throat. 

“Is he okay?” Roy asked. Once again, his voice came out a little more strained than he’d meant it to, but he pressed forward all the same. “Is he still alive?”

“We’ll know for sure when he gets here,” Lance said, “but he was still trying to crawl away when they found him. It’s a good sign. As far as we know, he’s still breathing.”

“Wolt’s a tough kid, Lord Roy,” Alen added. “If a war couldn’t take him out, a wild animal sure as hell won’t either. He’ll pull through. You’ll see.”

Roy knew that Alen was trying to be reassuring, but he also knew that it isn’t going to be of any use. All Roy could think about is a trail of blood smeared through the grass and trees, and the sight of Wolt’s broken, battered body lying much too still at the end of it. Roy wanted to cry. He wanted to lie down and scream and wail and sob his eyes out.

Instead:

“Get the infirmary ready and inform the cleric," he ordered. "We can’t waste any time once he gets here, and I won’t have him bleeding out on his own in the hall.”

People were depending on Roy.  _ Wolt _ was depending on him. He couldn’t fail them. 

He refused to.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I never looked at this ship from Roy's perspective before this and I guess I wanted to take a shot at characterizing him?? Also i wanted to write gore and give my 13-yo self everything they ever wanted lmao
> 
> Also you can tell that roy's never kissed before because if my husbando tasted like dirt, wax, and sweat I would probably have some questions
> 
> Recommended listening: Achillles, Come Down - Gangs of Youth


	2. fall into place

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _  
He stumbled into faith and thought,  
"God, this is all there is?"  
The pictures in his mind arose  
And began to breathe  
And no one saw and no one heard  
They just followed lead  
The pictures in his mind awoke  
And began  
To breed_
> 
> __

The tavern is closed, had been all day, but the misses was out and Ava had stolen the spare key a week ago. It was hard, working the lock and then the door while trying to lift the hugeness of her companion’s girth on her small, petite frame, her long brown hair falling out of her bun and matted with the man's blood, but soon the door had slammed open and she managed to get the bleeding man hanging off her shoulders into the back room.

The trip up the stairs was brutal. Her companion's leg had been injured, his arms mauled, and he seemed content with just groaning in her ear and letting her do all the hard work. When they finally came upon the old man’s room Ava felt no guilt in throwing her companion at the door to open it.

With luck the heavy wood door had not been locked, and when it swings open Lewis hits the floor on the other side hard, a strangled yell ripping from his mouth. To Ava’s displeasure, the old man sitting at the desk in front of the window doesn't even flinch, let alone look up. She huffs, a bit disappointed and very out of breath, and raises up her skirts in her hand to step over the moaning, squirming man curled on the floor.

“He fucked up,” she says in greeting, and the old man just grunts in response. “Did you hear me, Doran? He botched it.”

“Perhaps,” the old man, Doran, says as he puts down his quill, “you should fetch the vulneraries before we continue this conversation. Poor Lewis looks rather put out, don’t you think?”

Ava puffs up and is ready to object--she’d just dragged a six foot man across half the back allies in town!--but Doran shoots her a look as he turns in his chair, so she just turns red and does as she’s told, muttering under her breath as she leaves the room and stomps back down the stairs.

“So, Lewis,” says Doran. He opens a drawer in his desk, taking out a stained, worn rag. “I see you’ve run into some trouble today.”

The man on the ground groans, and Doran stands to tend to him.

Ava returns with an armful of supplies, and she barely resists the urge to throw the vulneraries at Lewis’s big, dumb shaved head. After they’re applied and Lewis is bandaged up, the old man sits back down in his chair and fixes them both with a look.

“Report,” Doran says.

“Lewis fucked up,” Ava repeats crossly. “Somehow Mr. Built-like-an-ox here lost a fight to someone half his size, and now everything’s a mess.”

Built-like-an-ox was a bit of an exaggeration, but Lewis was indeed a broad, tall, and square young man, his sun-burnt skin and strong arms giving him the air of someone used to manual labour. He’d be hard to best in a fight even if he didn’t have the advantage of surprise, and Doran suspects the deep, ragged gashes and tears in his arms and leg had something to do with his failure.

“Lewis?” Doran asks.

“Dogs,” the young man replies. He slides a glare towards Ava, grumbling. “You didn’t say there would be dogs with him.”

“There weren’t _ supposed _ to be any dogs!” Ava snaps back. “He didn’t go out with his dogs last time! And they were pointers, how could they have done this much damage anyway?”

“With their teeth,” Lewis responds flatly. Doran pinches the bridge of his nose with his fingers; these two never could get along. “They interrupted me, and he had such a _ wonderful _ look on his face while I was stabbing--”

“Oh gods, not _ the look _ again, you never shut u--”

“Enough,” Doran interrupts both of them crossly, grabbing his walking stick from the side of his desk and banging it heavily against the floor. Both of his confederates quiet immediately, Ava’s jaw clicking shut and Lewis glaring at the floor. “No more editorializing. Tell me, step by step, what happened.”

And they did, Lewis starting from the beginning and Ava interjecting when he got off topic, as he was wont to do when describing the process of a kill.

Lewis had been waiting in the hunting grounds, silently tracking behind his target as he wandered through the woods. After a while the other man had stopped to listen for prey, his hand reaching silently for the arrows in his quiver, and Lewis had taken the chance to creep up behind him and draw his knife.

“I was surprised,” Lewis says. “He looks small--”

“Everyone looks small to you, dumbass.”

“--but he fought back immediately. There’s muscle under that uniform. I had to hold him down just to finish stabbing him.” A strange gleam crosses over Lewis’ eyes and he grins. “Oh, he wanted to kill me, he really did. The look of hatred on his face…”

Ava clears her throat, annoyed, and Lewis rolls his eyes before continuing.

“That’s about when the damn dogs showed up,” he says. “I was about to bash his head in with a rock, get back on schedule, and one of his bitches appeared out of thin air and started mauling me.”

“He didn’t even try to kill the dog,” Ava grouses. “Can you imagine? Will flay a human alive, but a dog shows up and he’s running.”

Lewis looks at her, disdain painted across his face. “Why would I ever kill a dog?” he asks. “If only humans were so respectable, I wouldn’t be killing them either.”

Ava scoffs.

“Dogs hate you, idiot. You can’t go near a kennel without the lot of them trying to scare you off,” she says.

“Exactly.” Lewis grins a little. “Dogs know exactly what I’m about without even knowing me. Humans can know me for years and not realize a thing. It’s wonderful how stupid we are.”

Doran clears his throat, and Lewis’ gaze snaps back to him.

“Anyway,” He rubs at the bandages on his arm, wincing. “That’s all there is. I could barely make it to the rendezvous by myself, and then Ava had to drag me here. That’s it.”

Doran grunts, his hand combing through his scraggly grey beard.

“Is the target still alive?”

“Oh, I hope so,” Lewis jokes dryly. “I think I’m in love. I just can’t stop thinking about him.”

Ava slaps his arm and he grins, obviously enjoying her frustration.

“Act serious for once, would you?” she scolded. “This is terrible. This could ruin _ every _ thing! What if he survives? What if they _ find _ him?!”

“Then I’ll get to have a bit more fun,” Lewis replies evenly.

“Where, from the gallows? Because that’s where we’re all going, you know--”

Doran bangs his cane on the floor again, and both of them stop talking.

“We’re not going to the gallows,” Doran says, looking them both over disapprovingly. “Not unless you continue to act like children, and then I’ll be sending you myself.”

He turns his chair back towards his desk and gazes out the window, thinking.

“I don’t suppose we can make it look like a suicide or hunting accident after that kind of struggle, can we?” he muses. “We’ll have to make our next move carefully. We can’t have them thinking this is anything other than an unfortunate, isolated incident. We can’t have them catching on to us.”

Lewis clenched his jaw.

“I’ll be more careful,” he promises, his voice coming out like gravel. “He couldn’t even see me, you know. My face was covered.”

“That doesn’t matter,” Doran replies. “At least, it won’t for a while. Until Mavi and I can figure out our direction going forward you won’t be doing anything at all, Lewis.”

Lewis didn’t reply. He just ground his teeth, stood up, and limped out of the room, visibly furious. Ava turned and watched him leave, but the old man ignored him completely.

“For now, the torch is in your hands, Ava,” Doran turns towards her again, regarding her with his piercing grey eyes. “Do what you do best. Collect your information and report anything we might use back to Mavi, as usual. She will tell you your next steps.”

He turns his back to her once again, and he picks up the quill he had left on his desk.

“Make no mistake, Ava,” he says grimly. “The pieces are still falling into place. It’s just going to take a little longer now to connect them, is all.”

\--

Wolt was not attacked by an animal. Roy knew the second he saw him being dragged in on the litter, chest heaving and blood everywhere, that this was not the work of a bear or a boar, or any other beast that existed in Pherae.

Roy had inflicted enough damage in his own time to recognize the stabs and slashes of a sharp blade against flesh.

They wasted no time in taking him down to the infirmary. He’d had, apparently, several vulneraries already, but there was something in his wounds that prevented them from closing up. At least, that’s what the priest that a guard had harangued into helping had said.

That was almost three days ago.

Wolt was in his own room, now. The infirmary in the manor was small and without proper beds, only a thick, raised slab of elder wood and stone that served as an examination table in the middle of a hodgepodge of tomes and plants and experiments. Eventually, enough staves had been broken and things done that Roy didn’t understand that Wolt was deemed stable enough to be moved, but only just. Rebecca had been grateful, and Roy didn’t blame her; the smell of blood and tinctures, biting copper and herbs, was not a comforting one. 

Roy sat next to the bed, staring at Wolt’s unconscious face and the wounds slowly closing up on them. His face, much like the rest of him, had been covered in ever-rusting gauze and salve, but through the gaps in the stained linen his nose looked like it had been broken, and there was what must of been a deep slash peeking out on the bridge of his nose that looked like it might continue along to his cheek or up to his forehead. 

Part of Roy knew this was a self-inflicted punishment, forcing himself to study and stare and imagine. Allowing himself to spiral and create more and more gruesome injuries, as if carving them himself. It wasn’t healthy, he knew. It hurt. He couldn’t stop.

He couldn’t stop.

The healer he’d talked to had told him more than she probably should have, that both Wolt’s top and bottom lip had been torn right through to the gum, like a double-harelip that had needed to be seamed shut. How his right eyebrow looked like it had been slashed through with vicious strength. Even if she hadn’t told him anything, small remainders of the violence peeked through where his bandages couldn’t cover. 

There was a still-deepening bruise blooming on his neck. The few bits of the flesh of his face that could be seen had swelled up red and purple and oozed bloody against the sinew stitches that had been sewn in by the cleric to help it all set right. The fingers on one hand were still crooked and torn, the skin across his palm sliced to bits under the cloth that kept his wounds closed. Roy hadn’t yet mustered up the courage to look under the blankets, but he knew that his leg had been deformed when he was brought in, twisted and bent in a sickening mockery of it’s natural state. It was in a heavy splint now, carefully straightened back out, but Roy knew from watching Lowen after his break that it wouldn’t be the same.

Gently, Roy grasped his unconscious friend’s better hand as he studied the bandages that smothered both of Wolt’s arms and his chest. They’d been freshly changed that morning but they were already turning a damp brown-red, and the smell of stale blood and bitter salve stung at his nose. 

Roy hadn’t had the chance to see the worst of it after he’d been carted in, but his mind continued to fill in the gaps in his knowledge. Wolt’s arms must have been as sliced thoroughly as his hands, his torso riddld with still-bruising stab wounds and gouges. Honestly, he thought, it was a plain miracle that Wolt was even still alive. That he lasted as long as he did with all of the blood he must have lost.

As it was, Roy knew it’s going to take a lot of time and the help of many clerics to get Wolt back in any sort of working order. Lots of powdered mandrake and diluted belladonna to keep him asleep, to keep him from suffering. Healing magic greatly depended of the caster, of course, but it also took a toll on the energy of those it was cast on. For that matter, if a bone was crooked or a lump of flesh was hanging out of place healing it could be disastrous. To do this right was going to be taxing on everyone involved, Wolt included. 

(And Roy was _ insistent _ on it being done right, refused to let his friend have any less, to let him slip away without at least trying. He refuses to let him slip away at all). 

Roy exhaled quietly through his nose, and he gripped Wolt’s hand where it lay on the bed. What was he going to do if he never woke up? Roy was no stranger to loss, and he was ashamed to admit that it still terrified him. 

Somewhere in the back of his mind, the same place that lately has been making him worry over nothing and overthink everything, a thought nagged at him. 

Just… supposing, it said. Supposing that Wolt does wake up and all is fine and dandy. What then?

What then indeed, Roy thought. He watched Wolt’s chest labouring under the blankets and imagined the blade that missed his lungs.

Will you tell him? the thought nagged. After all this, is it worth losing him again? Maybe to a girl this time, or another man? Gods, imagine if it were another man. How would you feel about that? Would you be able to just keep it all in like you’ve always done?  
  
Truthfully, Roy didn’t know if he could still keep his feelings in check as carefully as he had before. He could almost feel a difference in himself, like something was about to break. Something secret and important that had kept all of his ugly things in. He knew, though, that telling Wolt wasn’t an option. Telling Wolt had never been an option.

There were lots of reasons. He was afraid of ruining everything. He was afraid of rejection. He was afraid of things changing, and of what it would mean. Most of all, he was afraid of what it might make Wolt do.

He’d always seemed to be so eager to remind Roy that he did not consider them to be equals, after all. That he’d do anything asked of him.

Roy’s thoughts were disrupted, once again, by a rapping on the door. He let go of Wolt’s hand in time to turn around in his seat by the bed and watch Rebecca slip through the doorway, her eyes red and tired but her face strong. She smiled softly at Roy as she closed the door.

“How is he?” she asked quietly, as if it were possible to stir the bloodied form lying limply on the bed. She looked so tired, so small, and Roy’s heart bled for her.

“Healing, I think,” Roy replied. “His breathing has evened out somewhat and he looks less pained. At least, I think he does.”

Rebecca smiled again, sadly, and she stands beside her son’s bed, gently pushing the hair out of his bandaged, sleeping face.  
  
Roy stood to give her his seat, and she placed her hand on his cheek gently, her eyes shining. It’s familiar. It’s comforting.

She and Wolt, Roy noticed, have the same eyes.  
  
“Thank you, Roy,” said Rebecca, “for everything you’ve done for us. For always being so kind to him. I know you two have been drifting apart these last few years, but...” 

Roy watched her blink away tears, and a surge of sorrow coursed through his stomach. He’s never wanted to hug someone more than he did in that moment, never craved comfort so much, but he knew that he couldn’t. He didn’t deserve it. He couldn’t let anymore pain slip through. 

He couldn’t let Rebecca down.

“Honestly,” she continued, taking a deep breath. “I don’t know what we’d do without you. We owe you so much, my sweet.”  
  
“Don’t be silly, 'Becca,” Roy replied. He reached up and squeezed her hand with his own, a kind, pained smile spreading across his lips. “You’re family. All three of you. This is the least I can do for my family, right?”  
  
The words felt like lead on his tongue as he said them, and that ever present guilt followed him as diligently as ever as he made his way to his study. He decided to try and keep himself busy, somehow. He attempted to get through his paperwork. He tried to write to his father. To Lilina.

His mind still wouldn’t stop buzzing.

Rebecca was right. For one reason or another, since their late teens, they'd been distancing themselves from one another.

On Roy’s side, a lot of it had come from a sense of anger and petulance at first. Even after the war, after that brief conversation about their stations, Wolt refused to stop treating himself like a servant. He just kept putting their working relationship into a vacuum, one completely devoid of their personal history, until it was the only thing about them that seemed to matter. 

Worst of all, he didn’t even have the decency to act saddened by their new distance. Wolt still had that same cheerful, enthusiastic energy about him as he ignored all the late nights they’d spent sneaking into each other’s rooms, the days filled with combing the river sides for treasure and play-fighting with swords made from tree branches. Wolt had turned himself into a stranger, and Roy didn’t know how to fix it. He didn’t know how to deal with it. If he was honest, deep down in his heart, by the time they had grown into adults Roy had become painfully lonely.

Maybe that’s why Roy’s feelings had morphed the way they had. Maybe that’s why his love had changed, had transformed into these gross, twisted, unreciprocal feelings.

And that was the problem, wasn’t it? Fundamentally, Roy didn’t--couldn’t--know if Wolt would truly reciprocate his affections. No matter what was said or asked Wolt was always cheerfully complying, doing as requested with a big smile and fewer and fewer questions like the loyal subordinate he seemed to so desperately want to be.

The idea of him not wanting his advances, of Wolt forcing himself to be with him out of a sense of duty or fear or obligation? That it was his job to humour him? Just the thought of it made Roy feel too nauseous to breathe.

Wolt deserved better than that. His whole family did.

Roy couldn’t help but wonder how Rebecca would feel if she knew just how badly Roy’s heart wanted to betray their family, their bond. That, too, was selfish of him. Roy’s emotional strife was the least of her problems. Her son nearly just _ died_, could still die, and here he was worrying about about a dumb crush and the inane power imbalance that messed it all up.

That old, familiar shame began to pool in Roy’s stomach again. Back in Wolt’s room he had said that they were family, but they weren’t. They couldn’t be. 

You weren’t supposed to feel about family the way he felt about Wolt.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> recommended listening: Blue Lips - Regina Spector


	3. cold steel and beloved flesh

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _  
How do you feel so proud?  
Every time I close my eyes  
The colours fade and change inside my mouth  
It's all too loud  
I sink my teeth into my fingers  
Blood forms branches in the water  
_

When Roy had written Lilina, he had expected a letter in return, one filled with condolences and concern and offers of aid. He hadn’t expected Lilina herself to arrive in Roy’s foyer later that week, Bors and a small gathering of personal staff in tow.

“Roy!” Lilina’s eyes were distraught as she embraced him in greeting, but her voice was strong and her arms comforting. “I’m so sorry. Has my letter arrived yet? How are you? How is Wolt? Is dear Rebecca okay? And Sir Lowen? I’d like to see them, if I may.”

“I--”

The sound of a throat clearing rang out in the hall. Their hug had lasted perhaps a bit too long, it seemed, and they reluctantly parted when Lance gave a pointed look to the few staff milling around the periphery. 

"I didn't realize you were coming," Roy said, an air of uncertainty laced in his voice. He could faintly hear the maids whispering to each other as they dispersed. "I'll have to prepare you a room. Are you sure it's alright?"

"Of course it is," Lilina replied. "The moment I'd heard I decided that I couldn't leave you to yourself at a time like this." She smiled at him kindly. "I know how you tend to overthink things, and I wanted to come help in any case."

"Help?" Roy repeated uncertainly. "In what way?"

"In helping catch the villain who did this," explained Lilina, as if it's the most obvious thing in the world. "We've been doing some fascinating things in Ostia these last few years, and you see, I think that maybe if we…"

Roy raised his hands in what he hoped was a politely placating way as Lilina started to effuse seriously about how blood fell, and about primary scenes and a slew of other things that went completely over Roy's head. 

"Hold on, wait a moment!" He took half a step back, confusion and concern written on his face. "Are you sure you should be here? You're queen of a country now, Lily. You've got the most responsibility out of all of us."

"I _ know _ that," Lilina objected. She seemed hurt by the insinuation, and immediately Roy felt guilty for making it. "I’ve been one for years. I made the proper arrangements before I left, I'm not a _ child, _Roy. The country is not going to go to ruin because I left for a fortnight. This is important." 

Her glare softened then, her eyes saddening.

"He was my friend, too, Roy," she said, and her voice was so small and heart broken that Roy felt himself immediately deflating.

That was true, wasn't it? She hadn’t been as close as them, but Lilina and Wolt had gotten on like a house on fire back when they were young. Roy felt ashamed at how often he needed to keep reminding himself that he wasn't the only person who was hurting.

"I know, Lilina," said Roy. "I'm sorry. Let's go find Rebecca and Lowen while we wait for your rooms to be prepared and see how they feel about all of this, okay?"

Rebecca and Lowen are both busy with their duties, but when Lilina took them aside and offered her help they both agreed immediately. 

“Find whoever did this,” Rebecca had said, her eyes shining as Lilina held her hands, “so that I can laugh as I watch their damned head come off.”

That is why Roy found himself in Wolt’s room again, watching awkwardly as Alen helped a cleric lift and turn and remove his friend’s dressings as per Lilina’s instruction.

Wolt groaned, still fighting against the sleeping draught in his system, and as they removed the bandages girding his chest and torso Roy tried his best not to stare at the miles of scabs and bruises and ripped skin, at the stitches, at the clotting and congealing brick-black wounds. Now wasn’t the time to fuel his new, masochistic habit. Now wasn’t the time to imagine cold steel rendering through beloved flesh, precious life splattering against the grass and dirt and worms. Roy swallowed down the knot that grew in his throat and paid attention.

“Easy, there,” Alen muttered, as gentle as Roy had ever seen him. Lilina craned her head to get a better look.

“No wounds on his back?” she asked.

“Superficial bruising and scratches,” replied the cleric. Roy had almost forgotten she was there. “I assume from being thrown against the forest floor. Nothing serious, my dear.” 

Roy didn’t recognize her straight away--she was the cleric who had first attended to Wolt, but was she one of the usual clerics that they keep on retainer in the infirmary or was she from town? He realized, with a bit of shame, that he didn’t know. She was an older lady, plump and healthy looking, and after a bit of thought Roy thought her name might be Deirdre. Her dark grey hair was short and pulled back into a tight little bun, and her eyes were kind and crinkled when she smiled.

Lilina nodded, and when they laid Wolt back on the bed she stepped forward, her face focused and determined.

“Oh, Wolt,” she murmured gently. Despite himself, Roy traced the path of her fingertips with his eyes as she ran them over the other man’s mottled, bruised, stitch-ridden torso. Wolt made a strained, painful sounding croaking noise deep in his throat, and immediately Alen reached out a hand to pat his hair down. Despite keeping up his usual confident demeanor, his eyes were full of concern and his hands were tender. Roy watched as he petted the bruised, swollen side of the younger man’s face.

“Shush, now,” he muttered gently, as if comforting a younger sibling’s night terror.

“How far along is his healing?” asked Lilina. She pressed her fingers against a yellowing bruise, checking the tenderness of the flesh. There was no response from her patient this time besides a furrowed brow, and Lilina moved on to the next wound.

“It’s been slow going,” said the healer in her kind, low voice, “but we think that he’s stopped bleeding inside, and his skin has been closing up, thank Elimine. He’s going to want to stay asleep for a long while, I’m afraid.”

Lilina clicked her tongue and bit her lip.

“Is his leg broken or sprained?”

“Broken. It was quite a difficult set.”

Lilina reached down, gently, and touched Wolt’s throat. 

“Poor thing,” she said. “He put up such a fight. It’s just _ vicious. _” 

Roy frowned. “Oh?” he asked. 

“He was held down at one point,” Lilina explained. “See this hand print? It hasn’t even yellowed yet. And look at his forearms--” Gently, she turned them so that Wolt’s palms were turned up and the inside of his arms were showing. They’re as mauled and mottled as the rest of him, blade wounds scattered and clotting, and upon closer examination his blunt fingernails still had something muddy-black caked under them. 

“--they’re covered in shallow slashes, as are his hands. Defensive wounds. I think he might’ve grabbed the blade, here--” she ran a finger over the gash in one of his palms. “--and there’s blood under the fingernails; he definitely was scratching at something, probably his attacker’s face or arms.” Softly, Lilina rubbed Wolt’s shoulder comfortingly with her thumb. “That was probably when they broke his nose and leg, while trying to get him on the ground. It must’ve been a violent struggle. Have you seen the site of the attack yet?”

Roy shook his head.

“No, I--”

Lilina went to remove the rest of the sheet from Wolt’s battered form, and both Roy and Alen immediately lunged forward to stop her.

“No no, hold up!” Roy yelped at the same time Alen goes “Lady Lilina, wait!”

“What’s wrong?” Lilina asked, her brow furrowing.

“Don’t--he’s not _ wearing _ anything, Lily!” Roy said hoarsely, his eyes wide. “You can’t just--”

“It’d be very embarrassing for him,” Alen supplied. “Especially in front of Lor--er, in front of a lady. His modesty--”

“Alright, alright,” conceded Lilina, and though she looked a bit put out there’s a hint of a blush on her cheeks. “I’ll just ask the cleric, then. I’m only making sure there’s no injuries or marks, you know. Ruling out motive, or evidence.” 

Roy wanted to ask why in the world any injuries _ there _would even matter, but when he caught Alen’s eyes the red paladin just shook his head at him, eyebrows raised. Well, then.

“Has he quarrelled with anyone lately?” Lilina asked, as if she just didn’t try to flash Roy with the subject of his ardor’s private parts. “Anything that would constitute such violence?”

Roy shrugged, his face still as red as his hair. Of course he’s _ seen _ him before, he thought, but… but they were children, and innocent, and Wolt was _ aware of his surroundings. _

“Not that I know of,” he replied, forcing himself back to the moment. He looked to the other man in the room. “How about you, Alen? You’re acting marshal right now. Any conflicts?”

Alen shook his head slowly as he thought.

“Wolt’s always gotten along well with the other servants,” he said. “Even the lower staff. He likes to help out with chores, so he’s very popular with the maids. Maybe a jealous lover got the wrong idea?”

The hairs on the nape of Roy’s neck bristled sharply at the thought of a girl making doe-eyes at his friend, but he firmly ignored it. It’s none of his business. He was just as bad anyway, he thought.

Lilina smiled, a little wry one, and pet Wolt’s hair gently.

“Wrong idea indeed,” she said, and Roy distinctly felt like he was being left out of some secret conversation. “A crime of passion _ does _ align well with the bruising that occurred with his stabbing wounds. We’ll have to make up a list of people to interview before we set out for the primary scene. Shall we round up volunteers for a search party in the meantime?” 

Lilina’s utterly determined, and though Roy feared that he still had no idea what she was talking about, he found himself endlessly thankful that she had decided to come.

\--

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is very short but I just want Wolt to get his head pet very gently by everyone.
> 
> Recommended listening: Devil Town - Cavetown


	4. forget the meat

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _If I wanna be rich, I've got to find my soul  
Oh, before I sleep.  
If I wanna be rich, I've got to turn my wheel  
some to earn my keep.  
If I want to have light by day and fire by night,  
I'll will my wild eyes bright.  
_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW: bad-taste jokes are made about sexual abuse, character has a panic attack in first half of chapter. stay safe beloveds <3

Ava was a very good maid. 

Perhaps it was her eye for detail, or maybe her extraordinary memory, but she took to domestic work like a fish took to water. Really, as long as she kept her head down and worked hard, she was ensured to have a very successful, if unrewarding, career in housekeeping.

What a pity it was, then, that she hated it so much. 

Ava had been cleaning other people’s homes from the moment she could walk. Her mother was a domestic, once, and Ava had watched as she ruined her knees and broke her back for the sake of someone who had never known hunger, or pain, or despair. She watched as her mother was abused, and she was well aware that she and her sister would not exist if the heir of the household hadn’t taken such a keen interest in disciplining the staff.

Ava hated housework and all it entailed, but she thought that it was worth it if she could see these people hang.

She didn’t pretend to understand the plan. No-one had bothered to tell it to her in the first place. As such, from her point of view it was convoluted and nonsensical, a series of dominoes set up in an intricate pattern that didn’t match up. 

She didn’t complain, though. That wasn’t her place in things. She just didn’t understand why the  _ killings _ had to continue. To maybe cast off suspicion if one of them were found out? Ava wasn't sure if that much death was worth the security.

This is what Ava was thinking about as she did her work. She spread a large canvas tarp in front of the fireplace she was readying to clear out, and bit her lip.

Why, she wondered, did they even have to murder that last one? As far as Ava knew--and Ava knew a lot, mind you--the man that Lewis had botched was only the cook’s son. Yes, he was a retainer, but at most that meant that he was a glorified dog sitter and an errand boy to higher born members of the staff. She'd heard that his father was a knight before some accident and his grandfather had been a magistrate, but only for a small village--a class traitor maybe, but nowhere near important enough to warrant  _ murder _ .

Ava put on her over-apron and started shoveling the spent coals and ashes from the ornate fireplace into her bucket. It just didn’t make  _ sense _ to her. Maybe it was because he was such a suck up to the nobility? Following the Marquis like a little dog, continuing with the family lineage of doing all his lord said without question. Either way, it seemed like boiling a rat in a pot of gold; a waste of time and resources for nothing important.

Behind her, the door to the drawing room opened. It was a pair of parlour maids, ones she’s gossiped with plenty of times before. May have called friends, had circumstances been different. They must’ve come to start the dusting, and Ava greeted them, readying herself to listen as she scrubbed the hearth.

The maids didn’t take long to indulge. Gossip is the one thing that the lower staff have plenty of, and they always leapt at the chance to trade it back and forth like a hot iron.

Luckily for Ava, today the hot topic seemed to be the man Lewis had tried to kill.

One of them (a pretty, plump little blonde named Mary, she had a brother who had worked here as a footman but had eloped with a scullery maid two years ago) seems rather saddened by the retainer’s circumstances, while the other (a tall redhead with short bobbed hair, her name was Caewynn and she had a bad habit of stealing lace doilies, of all things) has a more jaded outlook on the events.

“I wonder how long it’ll be until he’s ready to work again?” Mary asked softly. In the reflection of the gold leaf covering the mantle, Ava could see her opening one of the many curio cabinets, and she sadly wiped down a small porcelain figure. “He was ever so nice, wasn’t he? Always helping out here and there with the heavy lifting. It’d be a shame if he never came back to work here.” 

“If this Watt git even survives, you mean.” Caewynn said. She’d started wiping down a huge clock in the corner, and she had to twist around a bit to see her companions properly. “Jenni--you know her, she’s the new one in the stables--she told me that he was mauled by a bear or his dogs or something. Hard to bounce back from that, I’d think.”

Good, thought Ava. She scraped out the last chunk of coals that were sticking to the bottom of the firebox into her bucket as she nodded, picking up the hearth brush to finish cleaning out the ash. You keep on spreading that rumour, Jenni. Don’t let anyone believe any different.

“You know his name is Wolt,” Mary scolded. “But do you really think it’s that bad?

“Either way, they’ll probably replace him,” Caewynn replied, undaunted. “The only reason he’s a retainer in the first place is because he was  _ sort of _ handsome, and you don’t come out from a mauling looking nicer for it.”

“Caewynn!” Mary sounded scandalized, though Ava would have thought that spending time with Caewynn would’ve cured her of that long ago, and she turned to fix her coworker with a stern look. “Don’t you talk like that! It’s a right tragedy what happened, you know! Right, Ava?”

“I suppose,” Ava replied, her tone noncommittal. Better to listen than to talk. People will tell you anything when you listen.

Caewynn laughed, obviously looking to get a rise out of her from the start, and Mary turned with a huff to wipe down the cabinet windows.

“Besides,” said Mary, “I’ve heard that his mother was the current Marquis Pherae’s wet-nurse. They grew up close because of it and that’s why he was appointed to the retinue.”

The redhead right out scoffed at that, and she gave Mary a disbelieving glance.

“Joking now, are we?” she replied haughtily, and though Ava had stopped cleaning the hearth to watch neither woman seemed to notice. “Like a Marquis would stoop so low as to let his heir play with a  _ servant’s  _ child. We all know why he was given that empty position.”

“Oh?”

Caewynn grinned wickedly.

“Well, how does any enterprising young thing earn the favour of his lord?” she asked, and she paused, expectantly waiting for the blonde’s reaction. Ava felt a trickle of dread prick at the back of her neck at the other woman’s tone.

Mary just stared at her blankly. Caewynn rolled her eyes and threw her rag at her.

“I’m saying that m'lord was fucking him, you idiot.”

Of course. Suddenly, Ava could feel her skin begin to buzz as that familiar rush of anxiety flooded her mind. Of course, of course.

“Caewyn!!” Mary squealed, but there was an amused grin on her face and a hint of laughter in her voice as she threw her own cloth at the redhead. Of course. Of course. “You wicked thing! Stop teasing me already!”

Caewynn giggled and ducked under Mary’s arm, swerving around and tugging on her friend’s long braid playfully. Of course it’s the same. Of course they delight in it.

“I’m serious!” Caewynn said, still laughing. “We’ve all seen the awkward way they interact when they’re in a room together. M’lord is obviously receiving  _ favours _ .” She wiggled her eyebrows at that, and Ava felt the need to vomit rise in her. “Being paid lip service, you know? He’s a grown man, surely he’d be married with a child by now otherwise.”

Mary snickered despite herself and shooed the redhead away with her fingertips. Caewynn looked to Ava with a grin on her face, obviously expecting her agreement. Ava started to fold up the tarp and gather her tools with shaking hands. She’s heard these rumours before. At every house she’s been in she’s heard them. They’re always true. Of course.  _ Of course _ .

“Is that why m’lord is taking such good care of him now?” Mary asked, eyes shining as she played along. Probably enthralled with the taboo of it. Probably wouldn’t be if it were her. “Wolt is very sweet, and I’ve heard that Marquis Pherae is very kind, but you’d think any noble would jump at the chance to get rid of all of those loose threads. You can’t have something like that getting out, can you?”

“You’re right,” said Caewynn, and she nodded sagely. “That Wolt of yours must’ve had a very soft mouth.”

With that the girls both burst out into peals of laughter and giggles, and Ava dropped her trowel with a lound, clanging noise against the floor. Blood was rushing in her ears. She wasn’t in her body anymore. She wasn’t in the parlour. There was a candlestick in her hand and she kept swinging and swinging in the candle light, flesh and skull bursting under her meagre strength and splashing on expensive silks, and this horrid meat is what’s inside of us, this is why you run and run and don’t look back--

“Ava?”

Ava returned to herself then, and she was shaking, visibly, under the concerned and confused eyes of her co-workers. She was in the parlour. She was in Pherae Manor. There was no candlestick.

Suddenly, anger raised up with the bile and her eyes burned fiercely. She tried to raise her hands to her eyes to wipe them but they were shaking too hard, she was shaking too hard. She tried to open her mouth to speak but all she could do was gasp around the lump in her throat. She didn’t realize that she’d been holding her breath.

Absolutely disgusting. How could they laugh at that? The reality that young Wolt could have been used like that went without saying, and it wouldn’t be anything new. Nobles, after all, always took what they wanted without asking. She was enough proof of that. Her mother was. She's seen the damage it causes (--red splurting against silk, rotten pale meat inside, is that what I look like--), felt the frustrating futility of seeking help. The lack of empathy those fools must have, she thought, blood boiling. The sheer audacity of finding such pleasure in the idea--

Maybe the plan was right about the collateral damage being justified afterall. Maybe some people weren't worth helping.

She couldn’t wait to see them all hang. She couldn’t wait.

“Are you alright?” asked Mary, and another sob wrenched itself out of Ava’s mouth inplace of an answer. The butler (a balding, wizened, distinguished old man named Davis. Last Ava had heard he had a horrible gambling problem and had recently lost his ugly pet cat to a ten year old in a game of tarocchi. Concentrate on the facts. Forget the meat. Forget it.) stuck his head in the door to scold them for their noise but was stopped in his tracks by the sight of them.

“What’s wrong with her?” he asked warily, looking all the world like he was facing a horrible chimera and not a crying girl.

“I don’t know,” said Mary, visibly distressed.

“She’s having a fit,” ventured Caewynn. “She’s gone all pale and just started  _ shaking. _ ”

Ava couldn’t say anything. She just gasped and sobbed, her lungs greedy to the point of pain after that first gulping breath. Her head felt faint and there was a halo of white in the air. She felt like she was going to die.

She couldn’t wait. She couldn’t wait.

\--

The search proper began in earnest the next morning.

It was still strange, would probably always be strange, waking up without Wolt to greet him, but Roy made due. Over breakfast Lilina laid out the framework for their day, and Roy tried his best to ignore the new servant hanging around behind his shoulder. Tried to keep the word ‘replacement’ out of his mind.

“Shall we start by interviewing the guards?” Lilina asked. She cut neatly into her fish, her knife and fork scraping against the fine china of her plate. “Or maybe the hounds keeper? I’d like to take a look at the dogs that Wolt had with him.”

“Wolt was the one who took care of the dogs,” Roy said, “but Lance has told me that the head groom’s been helping to tend to them in his place.” Roy had been pushing the food around on his plate more than eating it, but he managed to take a few bites of his chicken and his eggs before putting down his fork. “I feel like the guards would be the better ones to catch up with first in anycase.”

It was a bit more difficult hunting down the guard that had found Wolt than Roy had expected; he’d been stationed out at the village down the road that morning, and it seemed like it would take a while for word to get to him, so they decided to head down to see the dogs while the message found it’s way to him.

It was almost mid-day when they finally reached the kennels, but it was only a stone’s throw from the stables and Lilina was determined to get as much done that day as they could. The low stone wall surrounding the squat little building had been patched recently, and the smell of new mortar pricked at Roy’s nose. 

The head groom--his name was Cedric, wasn’t it? Or Colin?--bowed at them as they approached, and the page rushed to herd the dogs inside the kennel proper.   


“Marquis Pherae,” welcomed the groom, and he hurried to open the gate for them, bowing at Lilina again for good measure. “Your Majesty.”

“Sorry to interrupt your day,” said Roy, a bit sheepish. “We know your workload must have increased significantly.”

“Do not mention it, m’lord,” replied the groom. “It’s an honour just to be in your combined presence.”

Lilina smiled and nodded at the old man, but Roy couldn’t help but feel uncomfortable. He’d never gotten used to this kind of deference; Roy had never been one to enjoy riding for the sake of it and rarely interacted with his stable staff, but when he did Marcus had made sure that they treated him far more formally than any of his domestics did. His fame from the war didn’t help in that regard, either. It was more difficult, he supposed, to convince someone of your mutual equity when you weren’t around to demonstrate or enforce it.

“We’re here to talk about the incident with Lord Roy’s retainer,” Lilina explained, and Roy’s heart stung a little at how impersonal that sounded. “Do you know which dogs he brought out with him that day?”

“I would not,” said the groom, “but the kennel’s page should. Shona!”

The page stuck her head out of the kennel house when called, frowning.

“Yes, ser Cabott?”

Ah, thought Roy. Not Cedric, then. He’s glad he didn’t try to refer to him by name.

“The master and her highness would like to speak with you about the dogs,” Cabott said. “I assume you know which ones were last taken out by our huntsman?”

Shona nodded, a remorseful look crossing her features.

“Yessir,” she said. “There was Sweet Little Molly, of course, and I think he was hunting for bird so he brought Cox-comb and Tippler along as well.”

“We’d like to see them, if we may,” said Lilina. “And to talk to you about what happened.”

Shona nodded, her face grim, and she opened the front door of the kennel wide for them.

It didn’t take long for the two to be ushered inside, Roy and Lilina sitting on stools that Shona had hastily brought down from the upper loft. Despite the small size of the room there was ample space for all of them amongst the crates and hay; Cabott had left to attend to his stable duties, and all but three of the dogs were herded out into the fenced-off grass that surrounded the kennel. 

One dog desperately whined at Roy’s feet while another sniffed at a straw-covered rock, and the page had apologized profusely for their surroundings as she set up. Lilina waved her off with a smile and a sense of practiced, cheerful grace that Roy had always envied.

“I really liked Wolt,” Shona started glumly, and she picked at where her high boots met her trousers with blunt, well worn nails. “He never yelled, you know, and when I had to sleep with the hounds he always made sure my bedding was proper enough.” 

Roy watched as she blinked back a few tears, her gaze shifting to the corner. One of the smaller hounds noticed and put it’s little head on her knee, staring up at her with sweet, sad eyes. 

Shona pet the dog’s ears and said, “He's a good man, that Wolt. Always respectful and kind to me and the pups. I hope he’s okay.”

Roy looked her over for a moment. Shona was a pretty, tall young lady, probably in her late teens, and she had short black curls and smooth, freckled dark skin. Her features were soft and wide and her eyes honey brown, and suddenly Roy wondered if she and Wolt had been close. He remembered seeing her around when he’d come visit Wolt during his morning chores, and sometimes they’d be laughing together when he arrived.

Even now, her eyes tired and wet, Roy thought that she seemed like someone Wolt could have easily fallen in love with, and something in him twinges at the thought.

“He didn’t have any spats recently, did he?” Lilina asked, and she reached over to touch the other woman’s hand comfortingly. “Anything he wouldn’t have told his superiors? Maybe someone from the village?”

Shona shook her head, confused.

“No,” she said. “Why do you ask? Wasn’t he mauled?”

“There are some injuries that suggest otherwise,” Lilina supplied gently. Shona’s eyes widened.

“Sometimes he’d scold the other servants for feeding the dogs things they shouldn’t eat,” she said, bewildered, “but I never saw anything beyond that.” 

“Are you sure?”

Shona nodded as she shifted her gaze between the two of them. 

“It’s hard to imagine anyone being angry enough with him to hurt him,” she said. “Especially… especially like  _ that _ .”

She bit her lip then, tears once again threatening to spill, and Lilina leant forward in her seat.

“And what about you, then?”

“Me?”

Lilina smiled kindly at her.

“It seems like the two of you were very close,” she explained. “Could there be a sweetheart or a family member that might have been opposed to that? Or someone who held a grudge against you?”

Shona’s face flushed a dark, berry-red sort of colour, and she stuttered in her rush to get her words out.

“We--we weren’t  _ like that, _ ” she cried, frantic and embarrassed. “He was very kind to me, yes, but I have no interest in--Um--”

She cut herself off, then, as if catching herself saying something she shouldn’t have. Roy stubbornly squashed down the hope that sparked in his chest at her denial.

“But maybe he felt differently?” he suggested. “If he was interested in pursuing you, or even just looked like he was--”

“No,” said Lillina and Shona in near perfect unison, and as they looked at each other in silent understanding Roy felt once again like there was a second conversation going on without him.

“Wolt and I were friendly,” Shona continued carefully, “and we had a few things in common. We had the same… well,  _ interests, _ and I looked up to him as a senior knight, but that was all.” She paused for a moment, thoughtfully, before standing up and heading toward the ladder that lay in the corner.

“Hold on a moment,” she said, and she set the ladder against the hatch that led to the loft. “I think I might have something that could help.”

She disappeared upstairs, then, but she returned a moment later to hand Roy a small, torn scrap of cloth. Lilina’s eyes lit up when she spotted the rust-brown staining it.

“It was wedged between Sweet Little Molly’s back teeth,” Shana explained, and she nodded her head towards a dog that didn’t look particularly little or sweet, but who Roy recognized as Wolt’s favourite. “If a person attacked Wolt in front of Molly, then that’s probably theirs.”

The dog in question was a big, harried looking Etrurian Pointer, and Lilina instantly fell in love.

“Ooh, what a good, clever girl you are!” she cooed, and immediately Molly trotted over and rolled onto her back expectantly. To her delight, Lilina wasted no time in petting every inch that she could reach.

“Scratch under her front legs,” Roy suggested off handedly, his mind preoccupied with studying the tattered scrap. “That’s what Wolt always doe--”

He stopped himself. The bit of ragged cloth in his hand is stiff and dark brown with old blood, and Roy couldn’t help but think of Wolt’s bandages.

“Did,” he corrected. “It’s what he used to do.”

Lilina looked up at him with sympathy, and she sat up to face Shona after she finished spoiling Molly. Molly, for her part, looked insulted at the loss of contact.

“Have you shown this to anyone?” Lilina asked, and the dark haired page looked down and shook her head, ashamed.

“I thought it was Wolt’s,” she admitted. “Sometimes, when dogs are excited and there’s blood in the air, their instincts are sparked and they can’t help but take a bite. I didn’t want Molly to get blamed. We would’ve had to kill her.”

“You were protecting her?” asked Roy.

Shona smiled sadly at him.

“She loves Wolt,” she said, “and I know she wouldn't hurt him on purpose. I can’t just let an innocent dog be punished, m’lord.”

Sweet Little Molly put her head on Roy’s lap then, and she nudged at him insistently until he started to pet her. Molly licked at his hand before closing her eyes, and as he scratched her ears Roy felt an overwhelming sense of gratitude. This was the dog that saved his friend’s life, or at least prolonged it. He briefly wondered if she’d be allowed to visit Wolt in his room. If Wolt would ever be well enough.

Soon, goodbyes were exchanged and Shona saw them out dutifully, and as Roy and Lilina made their way back to the manor proper he turned to her.

“What did she mean, about sharing an interest?” Roy asked, and he reached out to steady Lilina's arm as her foot caught on the cobblestones, almost tripping her. “Is there something I should be concerned about?”

Lilina laughed a bit sheepishly as she righted herself.

“I’m afraid that I wouldn’t know,” she said, her face apologetic. She quickly turned her head as if to evade his gaze, and Roy frowned.

“Are you sure?” he insisted. “It seems as if you’re all dancing around like there’s this big secret. What if it could have something to do with the assault?”

Lilina took his hand and smiled at him sadly. It was meant to comfort, he knew, but it only managed to make him feel like a child being spared bad news.

“If there  _ was _ something,” she offered, “not that there  _ is _ , I’m sure you’d be told if it did. Otherwise, I would suppose that it’s simply not our place to say.” Roy frowned again, but Lilina simply started to pull him along behind herself as she cut across the grass.

“Now come along,” she said`. “I think I overheard Lowen saying that he was planning a roast for lunch, and I’d like a good meal before we head out again.”

Roy followed silently, but not before taking one last glance back towards the kennels.

Maybe, he thought, he and Shona should have their own talk.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chicken with eggs, as well as fish dishes, were legitimate breakfasts of choice for the wealthy during the medieval and rennaisance period. idk but that just seems really weird to my modern tastes for some reason.
> 
> recommended listening: Rich - Cosmo Sheldrade ft. Andrea Vargas


End file.
